UPDATE. This just in from Peter Welch’s office:
Thursday, 10 February 2011 17:06
The Vermont congressional delegation – Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) – will hold a press conference in Burlington on Monday when President Obama will send Congress a budget which reportedly will propose to cut in half federal funding for home heating assistance.The delegation led an effort in Congress that doubled funding for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program to $5.1 billion a year since 2008. The program provides critical heating assistance for senior citizens, persons with disabilities, and low-income families with children. In December, the Vermont delegation also successfully fought efforts in Congress to cut LIHEAP.
http://www.welch.house.gov/ind…
UPDATE: Bernie Sanders was on Vermont Edition today and in a response to a question from GMD, confirmed that the Vermont delegation will be fighting to maintain support for Fuel Assistance.
You can hear the broadcast at 7:00 p.m., or listen to it here:
http://vpr.net/episode/50484/
Interesting juxtaposition today.
First, the Shriver Center on Poverty Law (what used to be called Clearinghouse, and which publishes Clearinghouse Review, the indispensable journal of poverty law, published its Poverty Scorecard.
Vermont’s delegation did pretty well: A’s across the board. Not A+, but A is pretty good.
http://povertyscorecard.org/st…
Obama, on the other hand, not so much.
As reported in the National Journal:
President Obama’s proposed 2012 budget will cut several billion dollars from the government’s energy assistance fund for poor people, officials briefed on the subject told National Journal.
It’s the biggest domestic spending cut disclosed so far, and one that will likely generate the most heat from the president’s traditional political allies. Such complaints might satisfy the White House, which has a vested interest in convincing Americans that it is serious about budget discipline.
http://www.nationaljournal.com…
That’s more than ten times what the Republicans want to cut the program, and their cuts would come out of the no less vital contingency fund.
Members of Congress from the Northeast are already calling for full funding of the program, and demanding that the administration retract the proposed cuts.
We can expect our delegation to come out strong in support of LIHEAP. They’re all good on poverty, and Senator Leahy visited at least one meeting of the state’s Fuel Program Advisory Committee while I was a member. I’ve seen speculation that this is no more than political kabuki to boost the administration’s budget-cutting cred, but still, cut vital heating assistance to low-income families?
Obama, WTF?
really begs the question how far he is willing to go in order to defuse the Republican challenge in 2012.
What? Don’t tell me you thought Obama was on the left side of center? He’s been a moderate Republican for years.
Triangulation.
We know what he is. But if Mubarak can feel the heat (ahem), so can Obama, if we choose to turn it up. Let’s not just rely on our delegation, and get to work…
this isn’t triangulation…. it’s bullshit
there is no way I can vote for this bullshit in 2012.
I don’t care how stupid or evil his opponent is. I would rather not vote at all than vote for this bullshit. we might as well have a republican president, if this is what we get when we spend hundreds of hours getting “our guy” elected.
how many poor people are going to freeze/die so the rich folks could get their tax cuts? this with a democratic president and senate. there simply are no excuses.
“Well…there you go again.” The outrage is justified, but it’s simply the case that Obama is merely a lower level CEO, who takes his orders from The Board. He’s cutting Community Action in half while he’s cutting fuel assistance. There will soon be no agencies or national non-profits with funds enough to help the poor or address social (economic) ills.
This is not a ‘conspiracy’ or a ‘fuck-up’–this is A PLAN. Like a marketing plan, etc.. I think unrestrained, unregulated Capitalism will bring us to the point where we will not have the buying power we once had, or still have now, and THEN we all go TO WORK for the COMPANY STORE. Just to get enough trickle to eat–SLAVES have to be FED, doncha-know?
And, of course, the ‘superfluous’ poor and disabled will simply be euthanized. Or eaten?
This is where the Planet Earth is headed as “Adventures In Capitalism’ continue.
OR–maybe Obama has HIS OWN PLAN: bust the people’s chops enough and there WILL BE A REVOLUTION. Ya think that’s what he’s doin’? Nah.